pasté

Forms

pasté m (oblique plural pastez; nominative singular pastez)^[1]

• pastey^[2]

Chrétien de Troyes writes pasté and the plural pastez.^[3]

Etymology

It is formed from Old French paste (“dough”) + -é,^[4][5][6] with the suffix that continues Latin -ātum.^[5] Gamillscheg thinks it replaced an older word that had been given up because it coincided with the word for pasture land.^[5]

The noun paste is from Late Latin pasta (“dough”),^[1][7] which is from Ancient Greek παστά (pastá), a dish of cereal mixed with cheese, the neuter of an adjective meaning “sprinkled”.^[7][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is Chrétien de Troyes's Erec et Enide, about 1170, where a chest is opened and pies are taken out of it: S'an fist hors traire trois pastez “he had three pies drawn out of it”.^[3][4][8]

Semantic evolution

In Chrétien's romances the word is a pastry case filled with meat or fish: Perceval finds pies of fresh kid.^[3] A Glasgow glossary has it for a fish pie.^[9] In the late 14th century Taillevent writes of pasté en pot, minced meat cooked in a pot, and the phrase “to mince like meat for small pies” is from 1508.^[4] Later senses of modern French pâté, such as an ink blot (1606) and a block of houses (1813), came later.^[4]

Timeline

• c. 1170 – pastez in Chrétien de Troyes's Erec et Enide.^[3][4]
• c. 1180 – pies of kid in Chrétien's Perceval.^[3]
• 13th century – first Anglo-Norman record cited by the AND.^[2]
• late 14th century – pasté en pot in Taillevent's Viandier.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. a pie or pasty, pastry enclosing meat or fish.^[3][2][1]

Anglo-Norman

The AND records pasté, with the spelling pastey, from the 13th century in the sense “pasty, pie”, and refers to the English word pasty and Middle English paste.^[2] Etymonline dates the English word from about 1300.^[10]

Descendants

• Middle French pasté (→ French pâté)^[11][4]
• Norman pâté^[1]
• Middle Dutch pasteide (borrowed)^[1]
• Middle High German pastēde (borrowed)^[1]
• Middle English paste (borrowed; → English pasty)^[2]

Usage notes

Tobler–Lommatzsch, the DÉCT and the AND head the word pasté, the DMF pâté.^{[12][3][2][11]} The noun is to be kept apart from the participle pasté, “kneaded”, and also from pate, “paw”.^[13][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–), p. s.v. pasté
3. ^ a b c d e f g Dictionnaire électronique de Chrétien de Troyes (DÉCT), LFA / Université d'Ottawa – ATILF, CNRS / Université de Lorraine (2014), p. s.v. pasté
4. ^ a b c d e f g Trésor de la langue française informatisé (2004), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/tlfi; electronic version of Imbs, Paul; Quemada, Bernard, eds. (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française, Paris: CNRS / Gallimard
5. ^ a b c Gamillscheg, Ernst (1966–1969), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der französischen Sprache, 2nd, fully revised ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 726
6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 7:745
7. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. pâte
8. ^ Möhren, Frankwalt, Dictionnaire étymologique de l'ancien français (DEAF): Complément bibliographique, electronic version (DEAFBiblEl), Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, alma.hadw-bw.de/deafbibl (texts by siglum, with their dates), p. ErecF
9. ^ Godefroy, Frédéric (1881–1902), Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle, 10 vols., Paris: Vieweg / Bouillon, p. 10:292
10. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
11. ^ a b Dictionnaire du Moyen Français, version 2015 (DMF 2015), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/dmf, p. s.v. pasté
12. ^ Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 7:461
13. ^ Godefroy, Frédéric (1881–1902), Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle, 10 vols., Paris: Vieweg / Bouillon, p. 6:32
14. ^ Baldinger, Kurt; Möhren, Frankwalt; Städtler, Thomas, eds. (1971–2021), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'ancien français (DEAF), Heidelberg: Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften; DEAFél / DEAFpré, deaf-server.adw.uni-heidelberg.de, p. s.v. pate